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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22693333">Making The Most</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reis_Asher/pseuds/Reis_Asher'>Reis_Asher</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Bittersweet, Codependency, M/M, Mild Sexual Content, Nudity, Picnics, Post-Canon, Rain, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, white lies</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 10:28:44</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,884</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22693333</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reis_Asher/pseuds/Reis_Asher</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Hank has no intention of quitting the bottle. Connor has no intention of leaving him. He understands the man better than he understands himself, after all, and when he's with Hank, he feels more like a flesh-and-blood human than reality will ever allow him to be. </p>
<p>Some call it co-dependency, but Connor likes to think he's simply making the most of it.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Hank Anderson/Connor</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>51</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Making The Most</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Warnings: Hank abuses alcohol and has no intention of being rehabilitated, even though it's clearly affecting his health. Connor accepts Hank's alcoholism because he is also struggling with the fact that he's not human, which causes him a kind of body-dysphoric feeling. There is talk about sex including a mention of semen, but no on-page explicit sex takes place. There is also talk about sex as a kind of addiction. If any of these things are triggers for you, please avoid.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“I know you don’t—eat, per se, but I found this picture of thirium cakes online and thought you might, well, you know—“ Hank scratched the back of his neck, causing his long, scraggly hair to fall in front of his glossy eyes like two curtains closing him off from Connor’s gaze.</p>
<p>“That’s very sweet of you, Hank.” Connor didn’t miss a beat, even as he preconstructed methods of dealing with this awkward situation. Thirium cakes weren’t for eating, after all. They were for maintenance purposes, for mopping up internal blood loss caused by thirium pipe leaks. They looked blue in pictures after they'd soaked up thirium, not because they were made from blue blood.</p>
<p>But then, Hank never had been very skilled at using a search engine. As humans tended to say: “it’s the thought that counts”, and Connor decided this might be one of those times a white lie was in order. Connor suppressed the chuckle that threatened to give him away as he contemplated Hank cooking up the android equivalent of a medical sponge in his frying pan. Humming all the while, Sumo at his feet whining at the scent of cooked thirium, Hank being extremely careful not to get any of it near the St. Bernard.</p>
<p>He tried so hard sometimes, but the ideas he came up with when he was drunk were often half-baked and ill-advised. At least this was better than the time he’d ordered 300 android eyes in the middle of the night and forgot about it until he opened the box to find them staring up at him.</p>
<p>Connor was developing a sense of humor almost as a coping strategy. As he picked up a thirium cake, he figured it did look a little bit like a crab cake, if it was made out of dried blood and absorbent materials instead of crab meat.</p>
<p>“Can you taste the rosemary?” Hank asked, as Connor chewed up the disgusting cake. He could not, but it was impossible to taste anything over the overpowering baked thirium. His analysis module detected the herbs, along with breadcrumbs and a hint of cumin.</p>
<p>The Spring sunshine beat down on them, picnic blanket laid out on the grass in Riverside Park as kids played in the background and runners jogged by. It should have been perfect, but instead it was bizarre enough to seem a little surreal, like neither of them were really here and this was just a program, like the zen garden. A simulation, tricking his senses while Hank lay six feet under and he lay in the junkyard, throat ripped out, an enemy of the android revolution—or perhaps decommissioned by CyberLife after all.</p>
<p>A lifetime of Hank’s antics was infinitely preferable to that. He loved the human, even if his alcoholism was likely terminal at this point. There was no point bringing up rehab again. It would only ruin a beautiful afternoon. Hank has made it clear enough that these were his terms—take ‘em or leave ‘em—and Connor was strongly inclined to accept Hank the way he was, rather than not have him in his life at all. Hank wasn’t abusive or cruel. He mostly made it to work on time. He wasn’t harming anyone but himself. The fact that he wasn’t making the most of his life—well, who was, really? Connor wasn’t exactly doing what he’d been designed for at this very moment. He’d needed to be something less than a perfect machine to truly feel human, and the flaw that completed him was his love for Hank. A love that would see him settle for less and be happy about it, because the idea of a life without Hank in it was something he didn’t want to contemplate.</p>
<p>Storm clouds blotted out the sun. A splash of drizzle hit Connor’s nose. Hank didn’t seem to notice as he held a half-eaten sandwich in one hand and petted Sumo with the other.</p>
<p>“It’s raining, Hank.”</p>
<p>“Mmm. Just spittin’. Forecast said it was no big deal.”</p>
<p>Connor checked. An inch of rain was forecast for the afternoon. A torrential downpour. Maybe the forecast had changed, or maybe—maybe Hank had checked the wrong day, or something. It wouldn’t be the first time. It wouldn’t be the last.</p>
<p>Hank laughed as the heavens opened, sheets of rain dousing the park. Children and parents ran to their cars as the water drenched Hank and Connor. Even Sumo had the good sense to head to the gazebo, entertaining some kids who were seeking shelter there until their parents could pull the car around.</p>
<p>Hank leaned back, his mouth twisting into a wry smile. “How does it feel to always be right, Connor?”</p>
<p>Connor considered the question. “Not great, honestly.” He would rather not have known that Hank’s liver enzymes were elevated, that Sumo was suffering with arthritis due to his age, or that the thirium cake he wasn’t designed to eat was lodged in his abdomen, the baked thirium sticking to his insides like burnt tar. He'd have to scrape it out later, and it wouldn't be a pleasant experience. Opening himself up was a stark reminder that he wasn't human, and no matter how much he longed to be a real boy, it was an impossible dream.</p>
<p>Ignorance was bliss, and he knew that was why Hank drank. Honestly, if he had the ability to become inebriated, he might have tried it, just once. Just to understand what it felt like to live life in a haze, stumbling around cluelessly, fumbling through ecstasy like a fool able to live in denial of the truth.</p>
<p>Maybe because reality wasn’t all that. Murder scenes and heinous deeds. Hank was a clever man—brilliant, even. His bright blue eyes often sparkled with sadness, and Connor knew he had a complete understanding of the world they lived in and the gravity of his own situation. He chose to suppress it, because knowing the meaning of life was altogether too much to handle for a person as deeply sensitive as Hank was deep down.</p>
<p>“We should... probably go home, huh?” Hank moved their drenched paper plates, the remainder of the uneaten thirium cake swelling up as it absorbed the rain. Connor wondered if he'd chosen this moment to give up because he accepted he'd been wrong, or because the cold rain was sobering him up too much.</p>
<p>Connor nodded. “I believe that would be the best course of action.”</p>
<p>“Thirium cakes aren’t food, are they?” Hank’s eyes glittered, revealing he knew more than he ever let on. “I knew that. I just—“</p>
<p>Connor reached out and squeezed Hank’s forearm. “I know. It’s all right.”</p>
<p>“I always fuck things up.” Hank let out a labored sigh, fatigue apparent in his voice. He was tired, exhausted with the world and himself, and there was nothing Connor could do but comfort him. Take him home and offer him another beer to take the edge off.</p>
<p>“Let’s get out of here,” Connor said. He bore the work of cleaning up, wringing out the sodden picnic blanket. Cole had probably sat here once with his dad, bright blue eyes not yet jaded by the world, but Hank no longer had his son's innocence to escape into. He could no longer ease the daily horror of being alive by seeing the world through Cole's bright eyes, filtered through a lens that couldn't even conceive of the terrible things his father had seen.</p>
<p>Connor say quietly in the passenger seat as Hank drive home, rain pattering on the windshield. Sumo jumped out and rushed into the house as soon as Connor opened the door, shaking off his coat in the middle of the living room. Connor stood on something round, almost slipping, but he was able to correct himself in time to avoid falling.</p>
<p>He reached down and picked up the round object off the carpet. An android eye. He started laughing, something in his circuits tickled by Hank’s drunken purchase looking up at him. He recalled Hank’s abject horror as he’d opened the box. Throwing it up in the air with a sharp cry of surprise as three hundred eyeballs looked right at him. They scattered everywhere, rolling underneath every piece of furniture in the house. Now and then, one would roll out from a corner, or Sumo would bring one over to them like a toy.</p>
<p>Hank saw what was in Connor’s hand before he could hide it. “Oh, geez,” he remarked, and then, holding Connor by his damp shoulders, he broke into deep, genuine laughter that reverberated off the walls. The vibration caressed Connor's ear as Hank planted a breathy, wheezing kiss on the outer shell, and Connor felt Hank's laughter course through his entire body. The chewed up thirium cake dislodged from where it was stuck, passing through to Connor's disposal container. That made cleanup easier, at least. No rooting around inside looking for a congealed blood cake.</p>
<p>With that, the tension broke. Hank’s hands roamed across him, helping Connor out of his wet jacket and t-shirt, and Connor was glad to put the day aside and concentrate on this. Hank kissed a line across his back, worshipping him like he was a holy object and not just a broken machine. Connor surrendered to his touch, bliss swelling inside him like the thirium cake in the rain. He could smell stale alcohol on Hank’s breath as he whispered sweet nothings in his ear, the sweet, sticky scent an omnipresent cloud around the man. Connor was starting to like the smell. It was Hank’s scent, after all, and it seemed to mix well with his cologne, giving off a masculine musk that was uniquely his. </p>
<p>He supposed he’d adapted—like humans did—to the concept that this was just how it was. They'd make love, and then Hank would clean up, get out of bed, and wander naked into the kitchen to grab a cold beer from the refrigerator. Connor would follow, drinking in the sight of Hank—naked—chugging a drink while his flaccid, spent dick flopped against his thigh. Hank's essence would dribble out of Connor's hole and trace a line down his thigh—a crude marker of his desire. </p>
<p>The pleasure that coursed through Connor's circuits during and after sex was his choice of escape, the overwhelming impulses of orgasm shorting out his detective programming for a few minutes afterward. It bought him a few moments of respite in which he was unable to scan everything and anything in the room. Where he couldn't calculate probabilities and outcomes and understand that everyone he loved would someday die while he lived on for a hundred years or more—alone.</p>
<p>In the wake of orgasm, there was silence. Peace. The same peace he saw when he looked into Hank's alcohol-addled gaze. Connor supposed he was addicted in his own way, spending each moment of the day waiting for those few moments where he could relax and simply <i>exist</i>. It was when he felt most human, blind to the tragedy and doom waiting just around the corner, able to live in the moment.</p>
<p>Some called their relationship co-dependency—he'd heard the whispers at the DPD—but Connor preferred to think they were making the most of it.</p>
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